A new millennium and old problems for the UN

NEW YORK — With the birth of a new
year — and by some reckoning the advent of a new millennium— the international
community is bracing itself to face fresh political, economic and military
challenges.

But according to US President Bill Clinton, the 21st century will also
bring cures for AIDS and cancer, two of the world’s devastating diseases
which continue to take a heavy human toll.

At the same time, the human life span will continue to lengthen, with
some living beyond the age of 100, mostly in industrialised societies.

The bad news, however, is that technology would be so advanced that
chemical and biological weapons of the future — described as insidious
and deadly— will be tiny enough to be carried in one’s hand.

“The organised forces of destruction will take maximum advantage of
new technologies, and new scientific developments, just like democratic
societies do,’’ Mr. Clinton warns.

In the US, the dawn of the new year was celebrated amid fears of terrorist
threats both in Seattle and New York, which kept most potential revelers
at home.

The spectre of the faceless, nameless terrorist has also been haunting
the corridors of the UN: an institution which last week was also battling
the threat of the millennium bug.

As a precautionary measure, the UN did something unprecedented in its
54 year history: the Secretariat in New York was shut down for three days
with no one being permitted to enter the building. The doors open only
on Tuesday January 4.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan, however, is hoping that World War III
will not break out when the UN appears all but paralyzed.

But some cynics would argue that several of the world’s ongoing wars
— and peace negotiations — have been or are being conducted outside the
political reach of the UN, reducing the world body to the role of a bystander.

As member states negotiate the nuances and limits of state sovereignty
and human rights, the UN will be called upon to once again prove itself
in the new year.

‘’Unless it is able to assert itself collectively where the cause is
just and the means available, its credibility in the eyes of the world
may suffer,’’ warns Mr. Annan.

“If states bent on criminal behaviour know that frontiers are not an
absolute defense; if they know the Security Council will take action to
halt crimes against humanity; then they will not embark on such a course
of action in expectation of sovereign impunity,’’ he adds.

The question of state sovereignty— and the right of the UN to intervene
in the domestic affairs of a member state — will be one of the key political
issues in the year 2000 and beyond.

But the UN will continue to lose its credibility if its overall political
agenda is dictated by big powers or if its actions smack of double standards.

Last week India sent a strong message to the UN urging it not to play
the role of a mediator in a hijacking drama which began in Kathmandu and
ended in Kandahar.

A move by the Russians to bring the issue before the Security Council
was also thwarted by the Indians who feared that the Kashmiri issue would
be internationalized if UN gets involved in the hostage crisis.

The Russians, who were trying to selfishly make an indirect link between
the hijacking of the Indian Airlines plane and the growing “Islamic militancy”
in the breakaway republic of Chechnya, were told to drop the idea and back
away.

A request by the Taleban rulers in Afghanistan for UN negotiation to
end the crisis was turned down by Mr. Annan on the ground that the UN has
no experience in this particular field.

But as the Washington Post pointed out last week “the UN has more experience
negotiating hostage releases than most nations, and it maintains a team
of trained negotiators ready to act at a moment’s notice.”

The UN has successfully or unsuccessfully negotiated hostage releases
in several countries, including Iran, Lebanon, Georgia, Sierra Leone and
Bosnia.

But this time around, its non-role was dictated by India, which is clearly
a powerful nation by any standards.

One billion people. A 1.3 million strong military. A regional superpower.
And a potential permanent member of the Security Council.